Hymn #1He is the valiant Son of Peace. Together we are the Sons of Oil, we are the kings and priests of the Lord. His seat is at Nob. He is a furnace and is the prophecy of God. He has come to spoil and to scourge. He is the scorpion of change. With him comes growth.

He is to be desired and we shall strive after him. Together we shall be our father’s brother. He tells me to be silent and become still. To prate, babble and to pray! To cut away the desire to be high, instead to increase, flow, and give up the ego. Embrace this lamb unto dizziness and happiness with great rejoicing.

Our Lord is our father; benefactor, cherisher, sustainer; teacher. He is the blooming freshness; the blossom-time, and the fruit. We entreat him to enter, to lead, and to bear us up during our trials.

O ye light and darkness, bless the Lord: praise and exalt him above all for ever.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

This book is a short overview of the joyous freedom the Law of Thelema brings. The text taking the form of numerous examples from Liber AL vel Legis extolling this joy.

Chapter I is of Nuit, Lady of the Starry Heaven, who is also Matter in its deepest metaphysical sense, who is the infinite in whom all we live and move and have our being.

1. Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. A declaration of rejoicing and freedom as there is no law beyond Do what thou wilt!

2. Every man and every woman is a star. We are all free, all independent, all shining gloriously, each one a radiant world.

3. Come forth, o children, under the stars, & take your fill of love! I am above you and in you. My ecstasy is in yours. My joy is to see your joy. Even our infinite environment seeks our joy.

4. For I am divided for love's sake, for the chance of union. That even sorrow only exists so that it can be overcome.

5. This is the creation of the world, that the pain of division is as nothing, and the joy of dissolution all. Even death should be joyful.

6. Be goodly therefore: dress ye all in fine apparel; eat rich foods and drink sweet wines and wines that foam! Also, take your fill and will of love as ye will, when, where, and with whom ye will! But always unto me. Thelema is not an ideology of abstinence of material pleasure, but rather delights in them as much as spiritual pleasures as they are part and parcel of the human condition and ultimatly expressing your joys is inherently thelemic.

7. But ecstasy be thine and joy of earth: ever To me! To me! Through your expression of joy draws you ever near to Nuit.

8. Love is the law, love under will. The will is the highest precept but all is love. Realizing this the Law of your being becomes Light, Life, Love and Liberty.

9. I give unimaginable joys on earth: certainty, not faith, while in life, upon death; peace unutterable, rest, ecstasy; nor do I demand aught in sacrifice. The shackles of the slave gods are dead. The demand of faith is replaced with certainty. The hoped for reward after death is given in life. There thirst for sacrifice both of other and of self is over.

10. I love you! I yearn to you! Pale or purple, veiled or voluptuous, I who am all pleasure and purple, and drunkenness of the innermost sense, desire you. Put on the wings, and arouse the coiled splendour within you: come unto me! The need to live by the rules of the Gods and prove ourselves worthy are at an end.

11. Sing the rapturous love-song unto me! Burn to me perfumes! Wear to me jewels! Drink to me, for I love you! I love you! I am the blue- lidded daughter of Sunset; I am the naked brilliance of the voluptuous night-sky. To me! To me! Further call to come unto the dissolution of Nuit in unending joy.

Chapter II is of Hadit, who is the complement of Nuit. He is eternal energy, the Infinite Motion of Things, the central core of all being. The manifested Universe comes from the marriage of Nuit and Hadit; without this could no thing be. This eternal, this perpetual marriage-feast is then the nature of things themselves; and therefore everything that is, is a crystallization of divine ecstasy.

1. I am the flame that burns in every heart of man, and in the core of every star. Hadit is our inmost divine self and we ourselves are embraced by the eternal Nuit.

2. We are not for the poor and the sad: the lords of the earth are our kinsfolk. Thelema is not for the slaves but for the kings. To embrace Thelema is to become a king.

3. Is a God to live in a dog? No! but the highest are of us. They shall rejoice, our chosen: who sorroweth is not of us. We do not traffic in the trappings of the slaves.

4. Beauty and strength, leaping laughter and delicious languor, force and fire, are of us. Rather we traffic in beauty, strength, and joy.

5. Think not, o king, upon that lie: That Thou Must Die: verily thou shalt not die, but live. Now let it be understood: If the body of the King dissolve, he shall remain in pure ecstasy for ever. Even the fear and sting of death is not for us but only delight.

6. It is a lie, this folly against self. ... Be strong, o man! lust, enjoy all things of sense and rapture: fear not that any God shall deny thee for this. Again Thelema is not about attainment through repression, but rather through expression.

7. But ye, o my people, rise up & awake! Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy & beauty! Remember that all acts of love and pleasure are rituals, must be rituals. There are rituals of the elements and feasts of the times. A feast for the first night of the Prophet and his Bride! A feast for the three days of the writing of the Book of the Law. A feast for Tahuti and the child of the Prophet-secret, o Prophet! A feast for the Supreme Ritual, and a feast for the Equinox of the Gods. A feast for fire and a feast for water; a feast for life and a greater feast for death! A feast every day in your hearts in the joy of my rapture! A feast every night unto Nu, and the pleasure of uttermost delight! Aye! feast! rejoice! there is no dread hereafter. There is the dissolution, and eternal ecstasy in the kisses of Nu. To accept and understand the Law of Thelema brings freedom from the foolishness of the past. All you have to do is to be yourself, to do your will, and to rejoice.

8. Dost thou fail? Art thou sorry? Is fear in thine heart? Where I am, these are not. There is no regret, fear, or failure in Hadit.

9. Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. Be not animal; refine thy rapture! If thou drink, drink by the eight and ninety rules of art: if thou love, exceed by delicacy; and if thou do aught joyous, let there be subtlety therein! But exceed! exceed! Strive ever to more! and if thou art truly mine-and doubt it not, an if thou art ever joyous!-death is the crown of all. Strive ever onward to greaeter hights of love, law, and liberty.

10. There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt. Our freedom and delight upon the earth. 11. The word of Sin is Restriction. Again and again the repressions of the old are at a end, the only transgression is limitation.

NOTE: I find it interesting that no selections were made from the third chapter which is of Ra-Hoor-Khuit.